WWE And TNA: 7 Worst Moments Of The Week (Oct 23)
5. Everything Is A Big Stupid Joke
Okay, I don’t totally hate fun, I think Chris Jericho and Kevin Owens are gold together. They’re funny. I love Jericho's "you just made the list!" delivery. If they were the stars of a 22 minute sitcom, I’d watch it every week. But as a main event act on Raw? It’s just not a good thing. It really isn’t.
People don’t watch wrestling just for comedy. If someone watches a three hour show that's controlled by Vince McMahon looking for their laughs, then they're not living their best life.
Why Goldberg worked so well on Raw was due in part because he didn’t have to recite stupid WWE humor. He didn’t have to work in absurd network plugs, he was just a guy who wanted to kick some ass. It's what wrestling was built off of, and has made it work for decades. But right now, none of the heels are interested in kicking ass, they want to do comedy, 90% of which is really bad. Nearly every segment is trying to be so cute that no heat can be generated. No one cares who wins these matches, because the company is constantly going for laughs instead of building feuds we can get invested in.
Just this week we saw Natalya, who was briefly positioned as a credible heel when she battled Becky Lynch, showing photos of her cats to Daniel Bryan. The Shining Stars are forcing their opponents to buy fake Rolexes (what kind of stipulation is that?), Rusev (who is about to be in a Hell in a Cell match) is showing us photos of his family and A.J. Styles is stuck with a seriously, tremendously unfunny hooligan...